Terrors in the Night
by snapple79
Summary: Andy can't forget having a gun to her head and Nick pulling the trigger. How does she deal with it? Set in S4, but Sam and Andy got back together when she returned from the UC.


Another one-shot that popped into my head. I really wish we'd seen more of how Andy dealt with this on the show because no one can tell me she wasn't affected. Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think in a review. :)

Disclaimer: I don't own Rookie Blue.

* * *

**Terrors in the Night**

_Andy and Nick were standing in a warehouse with Von and his men, and she was terrified. Blackstone's fantastic idea had put them at risk. She watched Von hand a gun over to Nick and tell him to shoot her._

_"He's not gonna do it. He knows I didn't do anything," Andy said frantically, trying to figure a way out of this situation. Nick looked like a deer in headlights, not knowing what to do. _

_One of the men pushed Andy to her knees as she watched Nick turning the gun over in his hands. Why wasn't he saying anything, protesting? He was just standing there. Her heart was pounding and she had to force herself to breath._

_"You don't have a choice. It's her or it's both of you," Von said._

_Nick's back was turned toward her, but Andy looked up at him, tears in her eyes and scared like she'd never been before. She was quickly losing faith that Nick could keep them both safe. She wished Sam was here with her; he would know how to get them out of this situation alive._

_"C'mon Nick, you gotta do this. Alright, Nick, let's go," Von ordered. "Nick, come on. Nick, do it. NICK!"_

_"Shut up!" he snapped. "Just shut up, alright. Okay. I'm doing it." He looked down at Andy, tried to get her eyes to meet his so she'd understand. "Just trust me."_

_"Trust you? What do you mean? Don't Nick, don't!" She had a momentary thought that maybe they'd turned Nick somehow, that somehow during the last six months she'd been betrayed and he'd crossed over._

_"Just look at me." But Andy couldn't look at him. No matter what, he was still pointing a gun at her head she no longer had a partner that would have her back. "It's okay, just look at me."_

_Her cheeks were wet with tears now as the people she loved flashed before her eyes - her dad, Sam, Traci, the rest of her friends. The images played on a loop until the faces were pulled further and further away. "No!" She screamed._

Andy woke up with her eyes flying open and hands fisted around her pillow, and rolled onto her back gasping for air.

The bad dreams started a week after she returned from undercover. They mostly consisted of bad memories of that final day and often included snippets of moments from when Nick held the gun to her head. But she'd wake up and shake it off. She'd met with the shrink for her post-undercover checkup before the bad dreams started, so she hadn't lied when she denied having any. However, she was reluctant to now admit to anyone that these dreams had started. She was afraid it would get her stuck on desk duty.

However, as the days and weeks passed, they were getting progressively worse, transforming from just bad dreams to full out nightmares. This one had felt so real, like she was back in that room with Nick pointing the gun at her head. She could feel the concrete under her knees, she could smell the musty scents from the room.

She turned her head to see the blue numbers of 3:15am glowing back at her. She reached over to her bedside table to grab her cell phone. Sam was working the overnight shift for a few days, so she knew he'd be awake. _How's your night going?_ she texted him.

To say Sam was surprised at the message that popped up on his phone would be an understatement. He glanced at his watch to make sure hours hadn't passed by without him noticing. _Not bad. What are you doing up?_

_Couldn't sleep._ Andy tucked the blankets around her more securely, wishing it was Sam's body she could tuck herself into right now for comfort.

_Everything okay?_ Sam leaned back in his chair. It was a quiet night, so he enjoyed the distraction.

_Fine. Missing you._

Something told him she wasn't fine, but he let it go for now. _I'll stop by after shift with breakfast._

_I'd like that :)_

_Go back to sleep. See you later._

Andy rolled onto her side and, still clutching her phone - like somehow it was her temporary replacement for Sam not being there - she willed herself to fall back to sleep.

* * *

Several days later, Andy was sleeping comfortable next to Sam in his bed when the terror of the warehouse invaded her mind again.

_It was chaos. She was screaming at Nick not to pull the trigger, Nick was pleading with her to trust him, and Von was yelling at Nick to shoot her. She no longer felt she was talking to a partner, a friend, she felt like she was begging a stranger for her life. _

_"Don't Nick. Don't!"_

_He pointed the gun at her head. He wouldn't do it. She couldn't believe he would do it. She stared at the ground willing him to have some plan to get them out of this. And that's when she heard it, a sound she'd never forget._

_She heard the click of the trigger and then it was like she was having an out of body experience, viewing things from a third party. She saw herself crumple to the ground as Nick let the gun drop from his hands in shock._

_She watched him dropped to his knees, burying his face in his hands as he repeated "no" over and over. He'd been wrong; there had been at least one bullet in the gun. It had been a while since he'd felt the weight of that particular gun in his hands and he miscalculated. _

_She saw herself lying limp and motionless on the floor, a red liquid pooling rapidly around her head. It took her a moment to realize that it was blood; that she was dead. _

Andy bolted upright as she woke up. She couldn't breathe, literally couldn't get air into her lungs quick enough. Or maybe it was that she was trying to gulp in air too quickly and she was starting to hyperventilate. Her heart was pounding and her hand quickly covered it, as if that would somehow settle it.

Sam was quick to respond, reacting the moment he felt the bed shift with her movement. He sat up next to her, placed a hand lightly on her back, not wanting to freak her out more. "Hey, slow down, slow down. In and out," he said, trying to help her get her breathing back to normal. "In and out."

She closed her eyes and focused on Sam's voice.

"That's it. You okay?" he asked quietly.

She nodded her head. "Water...Can I get some water?"

"Yeah, sure," he said, leaning in to kiss her temple before getting out of bed. Minutes later he was back with a glass of water. He found her still sitting on the bed, but now her knees were up to her chest and her arms were wrapped tightly around her legs. He caught her rocking back and forth slightly before she saw him and stopped.

He handed the water over to her before climbing back into bed beside her.

"Thanks," she said, after taking a long sip.

He rubbed a hand gently up and down her back. "You gonna tell me what happened?"

"Just a nightmare," she replied, staring at the glass she held.

"I figured as much. Wanna tell me what it was about?"

She took another sip of water before placing the glass on the table beside the bed. She shook her head as she turned back to face him. "Not really."

He wasn't going to push her; knew that she would tell him in her own time. "Think you can fall back to sleep?"

When she shrugged, he pulled her against him, lying down as he did so. She immediately curled into his side, tangling her legs with his as she wrapped an arm tight around his abdomen. He let one arm hold her close, the fingers on his other hand tucking the hair behind her ear as she rested her head on his chest.

He wondered what the nightmare was about, how long she'd been having them and how often. He wondered if that late night text several days earlier had been the result of a nightmare waking her up.

He was pretty sure he felt a teardrop hit his chest, but he didn't mention it. She'd open up about this in her own time. And until then, he would just be here for her. Whatever she needed.

* * *

Andy was sitting on the counter in Sam's kitchen two days later watching him make dinner. She put down the glass of wine she'd been sipping on and wrapped her hands around the edge of the counter.

"They started a week after I got back," she blurted out.

Sam stopped what he was doing and looked over at her, eyebrows raised, wondering where her admission came from.

"The nightmares, that's when they started."

He put down the spoon he held, turned down the heat on the stove, and walked over to her, standing between her legs and letting his palms rest on the counter on each side of her. "How bad?"

"Just dreams at first, little snippets of the last day in particular. But they've, uh, they've gotten bad, Sam. They're so vivid," she admitted.

He tilted his head to catch her eyes again when she cast them down to the floor. "You wanna tell me about them?" he asked gently.

Andy swallowed and took a slow breath before responding. "You have to promise me you won't do anything, that you won't run off and do something rash." She knew his temper, and knew what it was like when someone hurt her or endangered her life. Nick may not be her favorite person right now, but she didn't want Sam to do something stupid.

"McNally..."

"No, Sam, I'm serious. I want to tell you, but you have to promise."

He ran his palms up and down the outside of her jean-clad thighs. "Okay, I promise you."

She stared into his eyes for several moments before beginning. "In the warehouse, before I called you...they suspected us of tipping someone off about the drugs. So, they told Nick he had to shoot me. It was a test of sorts for him and they thought I was the rat." Sam watched her intently, taking in each word. He hadn't been allowed to read the files about the undercover, except to sign off on his part of the takedown.

"They gave him a gun, and later...He told me later he knew it wasn't loaded." Andy could see Sam was holding back, fighting himself from exploding as he connected the dots. "But he...he pulled the trigger. He was right, there were no bullets in it - "

"But he pulled the damn trigger?" Sam was trying to remain calm, for Andy's sake, but he was having a hard time.

"Yeah." She pulled her hands off the counter and rested them on his biceps. "At first, the scene just replayed in my dreams. But the other night..." She took a deep breath and focused her eyes on the hem of his sleeve that her fingers played with. "It changed. There was a bullet in the gun this time and I watched myself die."

"Andy..." His arms were around her in an instant pulling her against his chest. Her arms went around his neck as he held her tight. "Why didn't you tell me this sooner?" His question wasn't accusatory, but filled with concern.

"I don't know. I didn't think anything of it at first, I guess. Everyone has bad dreams."

"No, I mean, yes, I want to know about the nightmares, but what Collins did. That he held a gun to your head. Why didn't you tell me?" he asked, hands coming up to frame her face.

She shrugged. "We were complicated enough when I got back. And, I guess I was trying to forget what happened. Not something you really want to relive."

"We'll always be complicated," he said with a small chuckle that brought a smile to her face. "Doesn't mean I don't want to know what you're going through, no matter how tough it is." His hands slid down to her shoulders, giving them a gentle squeeze. "Is this why...I noticed you haven't been partnered with Collins since you got back."

Andy nodded. "Yeah, I asked Frank to partner us with other people for a while. I'm not sure if he knows what happened, but I just…I'm not sure I can trust Nick right now."

Fire invaded Sam's eyes with the thought of Nick pulling the trigger, even if the gun was empty. The situation should never have gotten that far. "What the hell was he thinking? He should've been able to talk himself out of the situation, not put your life at risk."

She couldn't answer that. She hadn't quite forgiven Nick yet, so she couldn't justify what he did to Sam. "I don't want to think about why. I just want to stop reliving it."

"Right, right. I'm sorry. What can I do?"

She leaned in and pressed her lips against his. "This. Just this." She rested her head on his shoulder. He rubbed his hands up and down her back. "I wanted you to know. I…I want to be able to tell you what I went through."

"I'm glad you did," he said softly. "I want to help you through this."

They stayed like that for several minutes as Andy enjoyed the comfort of Sam's body against hers. When she inhaled the wonderful scents filing his kitchen, she felt the grumble of her stomach. "I think dinner's almost ready," she said.

Sam reluctantly turned toward the stove. "I think you're right." He placed a chaste kiss on her lips. "Have a seat. I'll bring it to the table."

She did as she was told and watched him move around the kitchen. She smiled, feeling a small bit of relief at opening up about what she went through that day. She knew she'd be able to get past the nightmares eventually, but having Sam help her though it made her even more confident. She'd get through this with him at her side.

* * *

The End.


End file.
